SEO Fundamentals Every Business Owner Should Know

Jane* was in the process of adding e-commerce to her clothing store given the challenges caused by the lockdown and increased competition. Happy with her new website, she checked for new sales several times a day, but… crickets. 🦗

She hired a SEO company that said they were “targeting high value keywords”, but nothing really changed. When she asked where they were targeting these keywords, they sent her a list of directories with strange names. When she found her listings they weren’t using her messaging and the overall presentation seemed unprofessional. 

By taking charge of your SEO, you can:

• Avoid old-school tactics that don’t move the needle
• Know what to ask when talking to SEO companies
• Ensure your company image is polished and professional across the web
• Make quick fixes or do it yourself
• Optimize your content marketing
• Understand the ROI of your SEO campaigns

Here are five SEO basics to help you stay in charge: 

Keyword Research and Targeting

What did the SEO agency mean when they said they were targeting keywords? Targeting keywords is a valid strategy but in Jane’s case they were doing it the wrong way. I asked to see the emails and noticed that they were targeting broad keywords and some of the things they were targeting had high value, but Jane did not provide the service. For example, they were targeting dress alterations. 

When targeting keywords, it’s important to start with your business goals. You might start with your product or service, but that is just the beginning. It’s also important to consider where people are in the search journey. Some people are just looking for information, while others want to buy. In Jane’s case a person looking for information might search for something like “fall fashion ideas.” Informational keywords are usually targeted through content marketing such as blogging. 

Secondly, you want to target the person who is closer to making a purchase. They might be searching for a women’s fashion store nearby, plus size fashion or some other more specific keyword. Jane might also want to research keywords for the brands she carries. In this case, optimizing sales pages, landing pages and product listings can help drive organic traffic. 

Most industries are competitive and women’s clothing is no exception. Jane would need to do more research to set her store apart. However, a general rule of thumb is to look for keywords that have high traffic and low competition. Some tools you can use to find these keywords are Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, or Ahrefs.

On-Page Optimization

The second odd thing the agency was doing was focusing entirely on weird directories that all seemed similar in design. It’s possible that they may have even owned these directories. Directory listing is an off-page SEO tactic but they were going about it all wrong. 

First of all, they weren’t doing anything to optimize the actual website where Jane wanted to drive traffic. This is called on-page optimization. 

Once you have collected the keywords you want to rank for, you can apply them to your site. You should use them in your headlines, subheads, copy and blog copy. Different keywords will be relevant to different pages. 

Another place you will use these keywords is in your metadata. Metadata refers to things like your title tag and page description. They aren’t part of your main content, but they are visible when your page comes up in search. Also the title tag is shown in the browser tab. 

Backlink Building

You could say that Jane’s agency was building backlinks, but they were using low-quality directories that weren’t used by actual humans. They also weren’t keeping Jane’s messaging and information consistent. 

That’s why it’s important to take a public relations approach to SEO backlinks. How do you you do this?

• Consider where you want to show up as a brand. 
• Nail your messaging so that people can understand what you do without confusion.
• Choose only the backlink opportunities that reach your target market.
• Develop professional relationships with the people you are pitching for backlink opportunities. 
• Incorporate traditional media for even greater reach. 
• Be consistent in how you list your contact information and brand name to avoid confusing the search engines. 

Content Marketing

Yes, blogging is a a slow way to begin your SEO journey, but there are many ways to promote your content while you wait for Google to catch on to your brilliance. When you have content to share, you’ll feel better about showing up on social media. Blog posts can also be repurposed into social media posts like captions, threads, carousels, Reels and Stories. 

Meanwhile, use your keywords in your blog posts and submit your sitemap to get discovered. 

Analyze what questions related to your business show up in the Featured Snippets. Use this as content inspiration. You might get a Featured Snippet yourself. (It’s not as hard as you think.) 

One place that bloggers often go for traffic is Pinterest. On most social media platforms, content with links tends to get lower shares. This is because they want to keep people using the app. However, the reason Pinterest is popular is because it helps users discover new content. Pinterest tried focusing on short-form video, but in the end it went back to what it does best. This means you can share your blog link and people can discover it on Pinterest.